Award Data

Ozone is arguably the most important trace gas in the atmosphere, and improved monitoring of ozone throughout the atmosphere is essential. This Phase 2 project continues the development of a complete, automated system for measuring ozone from on board commercial aircraft. There is already one program within NOAA, CAAMP (Commercial Aircraft Atmospheric Measurement Program), for measuring a variety ...

A radical, high performance system design concept for UAV missions is proposed. Its characteristics derive directly from propulsion and power generation capabilities inherent in microturbine technology under development at MIT. The proposed vehicle configurations is an oblate spheroid, giving a high package volume with sufficient fuel capacity for hover duration of about one hour. Thrust from m ...

Micro Aerial Vehicle (¿AVs) will open up a wide range of new missions for the US Armed Forces, but also present a new set of technical challenges. The power and propulsion system will have a significant impact on the ultimate capabilities and range of missions of ¿AVs. While advanced battery technology can provide good propulsion performance for ¿AVs, miniature internal combustion engines can ...

DARPA has identified a need for Engineering Decision Support computer tools for multi-disciplinary design teams involved in the specification, design and development of complex electro-mechanical products. During the product specification process, key decisions are made which define the product evolution and ultimately determine the product's acceptance by the customer. Current design systems ...

recent advances in sensor technology have enabled collection of vast quantities of battlefield information. Warfighters will soon gain global access to this huge volume of information. Rather than construct separate redundant, and inconsistent situation estimates, a Dynamic Database can reduce the data to a comprehensive, self-consistent representation of the environment. This proposal explores ...

We propose a SBIR program which will provide Basic Research and Exploratory Development of fluorinated graded index plastic optical fiber. Recent breakthroughs in the design of graded index plastic optical fibers have dramatically increased POF's data transmission rate. A bandwidth of more than 3 (three) Ghz at 100 meters has been demonstrated. Fluoropolymers with elevated glass transition temp ...

Brock-Rogers Surgical (BRS) proposes to develop a telemanipulator system that will improve the dexterity of laparoscopic instrumentation and enable remote telepresence surgery. The micro-manipulator will provide users tactile sensing through coupling to a force-reflecting haptic interface. The system applies advanced techniques in robotics engineering and sensory feedback developed in the Artifi ...

In our Phase 1 work we were able to replicate and build on recent results at NIST with superconducting transition (SCT) thermometers, which suggested that dramatic improvements may be achieved in detectivity and range of application, of cryogenic electrical substitution radiometers. Cryo-ESR's are widely used as the most accurate absolute standards of radiative flux and irradiance. In Phase 2, we ...

The growing digitization of the battlefield gives the commander an opportunity to access large amounts of information, but only a portion of this may be important at any one time in answering his Priority Intelligence Requirements (PIRs). PIRs are critical to the commander for making tactical decisions to accomplish the mission and each PIR necessitates identifying relevant tactical information f ...

Lidar systems offer considerable promise for the acquisition of a variety of atmospheric variables with very high spatial and temporal resolution from airborne platforms. Ground-based lidar systems have been demonstrated that measure aerosols, water vapor, and ozone, and airborne windsensing lidar have been flown on several military aircraft. The growing number of commercial airliners, however, of ...